God Always Wins

Newsletter September-October 2008

The life of a Christian moves in many areas that include the spiritual and the natural. Since the spiritual was first it is the most important. The modern society has tried to eliminate the spiritual aspect of mankind and categorize spiritual problems as physical disorders. As Christians we understand what is spiritual warfare “for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” Even though we live in a very natural world we are affected by spiritual events.

We had a very good trip this summer through the States of Texas and Florida. Even though few churches opened their doors for us to share our vision, we were blessed to be able to minister on a personal level. We were also able to spend some time with a Bible School roommate of Philip’s who was in the midst of a hard spiritual battle. In the natural we look to meet many people to supply our needs but we must never forget that our supplier is Jehova-Jirah and when He meets our needs we are lacking in nothing.

On the home front we are blessed to be in a time of tribulation as we are going through a time such as Paul wrote to the Romans: “For we know that all nature has been groaning and travailing together until this hour. And not only that, we ourselves, although we are grasping the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves are inwardly groaning, while we are waiting for adoption, the redemption of our body”. We are blessed in that tribulation brings us closer to our Father and makes us trust in His Word. If we were to look at our situation with natural eyes we would see defeat. We will share with you some of the struggles that we are going through:

a) Enrollment in our Secondary school dropped this year instead of increasing and we are $12,000 dollars short for our yearly budget. The Primary Christian school in our city that we worked with closed it’s doors for lack of finances

b) The youth activity we call ‘El Punto’ that we will be doing in different States was almost completely financed through offerings, pledges and support from foundations. At the last minute one of the foundations broke the contract and we are $80,000 dollars short at one month from starting the activities. We are going forward with the activities and our God will supply all of our needs according to His riches in glory.

c) Our national churches are all self supporting (except for our own income) but we have experienced a large drop in income to the place that we have spent all our reserves and we are living each day as it comes to just cover expenses. With all this we have not deceased our missions giving in the least.

All that is happening at this time are blessings as we are getting the opportunity to stretch and increase our faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. I know that some of you will be used by the Lord to help us through these trying times. What rings in my mind at this time are the words of Mordecai to Hadassah: “For if you are completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance shall arise to the Jews from another place,…. And who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for a time like this?” As the Lord was faithful with his people in the time of Mordecai so he will be with us as we march forward under His banner, Jehovah- Nissi.

We continue to pray rich blessings upon all you who support this ministry and the vision that we carry here in Mexico. We covet your prayers as we believe to meet our financial obligations for the projects we are doing. We appreciate your faithful offerings that help us to continue moving forward.

Philip, Lucy, Simri and Vanessa Tolman